Lockheed Tests DAGR Missile on Its Prototype JLTV

In what might be considered a marketing two-fer, defense contractor Lockheed Martin announced Thursday that it has successfully demonstrated not one, but two weapons systems that it wants the U.S. military to buy -- and demonstrated how both can be used together.

Specifically, the company says it has demoed a prototype Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV), which it is trying to sell the U.S. Army, firing Lockheed's new Direct Attack Guided Rocket (DAGR). At a series of flight tests conducted at Eglin Air Force base in Florida, Lockheed says, the prototype JLTV equipped with a Lockheed M299 Missile Launcher launched two Hydra 70 rockets, and also launched the DAGR, striking within 1 meter of its targeted spot -- 5 kilometers away.

The DAGR missile is a 70-mm, laser-guided projectile that Lockheed hopes will become the successor to Lockheed's popular Hellfire II guided rocket. It is intended to defeat "high-value, non-armored or lightly armored targets."

The JLTV is an armored vehicle program that the Pentagon has been mulling for more than five years now, in an effort to replace the venerable unarmored Humvee Jeep with something more survivable in combat zones, and in particular something more resistant to roadside improvised explosive devices. Lockheed is one of three companies currently still competing to build the JLTV for the military, the others being current Humvee maker AM General, and also mine-resistant, ambush-protected specialist Oshkosh.